Lagos Nigeria, Don't Go There?

I signed in to my MSN chat account and found below on the "Today" page

Don't Go There!
DANGEROUS PLACES: Perhaps one of my least-favorite places in the world is Lagos, Nigeria. It may be the country’s richest city, but it’s crowded, it’s ugly, it’s dangerous, and it’s not a place I’d recommend anyone visit unless you’re really into adventure travel. Lagos is a city of 15 million people (and growing) crammed into a space meant for half a million. It’s got inadequate infrastructure, unimaginable poverty and an often blatantly corrupt government that’s not interested in putting any of the city’s oil wealth toward its people.

http://travel.msn.com//Guides/MSNTravelSlideShow.aspx?cp-documentid=851621&imageindex=1

MOST TRAVELED PEOPLE

PETER GREENBERG (PG): Well, let’s talk about what constitutes an acceptable entry on your list. How do you come up with that number?

CHARLES VELEY (CV): I have a group, Most Traveled People. I run the Web site, www.mosttraveledpeople.com, and there are about 5,000 members. They all vote on what should be on the list … One of the reasons it grew to 673 is the members really wanted to count some of the larger countries state wise. That it’s not enough to go to New York and say you’ve been to the whole United States.

MOST DANGEROUS


CV: Once, I feared for my life where I got stranded on one of the remote islands in the world. We were on an expedition to Peter I Island which is down near Antarctica, but it’s about 400 miles away from Antarctica.

PG: How’d you get there?

CV: I was with a ham radio team. We went to Punta Arenas, the bottom of Chile, and flew to King George Island. We got on a Chilean Navy vessel and sailed about six days to the south. And then we got there and we had to wait for weather to clear. So, we took a helicopter from the ship to land on the island.

PG. And that’s just to be able to say you were there?

CV: We stayed for two weeks … and we set up a whole little mini-city for the ham radio guys to talk.

PG: Right. Just to go on the radio to say, “Guess where we are?”

CV: And, when you go to Antarctica, you have to bring out everything that you brought in. So, we had about 60 helicopter loads of just stuff … We had gotten through about 55 loads and the helicopter pilot was squirrelly. The weather came in, and he wouldn’t come and get us. So, the weather closed in and it’s supposed to be bad for four more days. And there was no more stuff around. We made a primitive sort of a shelter. Me and three Chilean sailors just kind of huddled up and didn’t know how long we were going be around. We had a little bit of survival gear. But it was cold and I had the wrong clothes. … We kind of made a little hut that we could barely squeeze into. And, by the way, mine was the only radio that worked. Thank God I speak Spanish. I was able to translate between the ship’s crew, these guys, and our guys on the ship.

PG: And they came back for you?

CV: Finally they came about 24 hours later. We were hysterically happy.

WORST PLACE

PG: Is there a place or places that you’d never go back?


CV: Lagos, Nigeria is definitely towards the bottom of the barrel.

PG: I would agree. Take a ride from the airport alone. It’s enough to make you want to go home.

CV: Oh it’s horrible. Well, I came in by land. And it’s all a permanent go-slow which is like rush hour … and it’s just people selling you stuff. Which is interesting on the road, but you’re choking on diesel fumes. And if you open the door, someone’s gonna try and rob you. It’s basically a city that was built for about half a million people and it’s got 15 million people living there. People camped out under freeways. … There was so much garbage piled up that people were digging like you shovel snow.

FAVORITE PLACE

PG: Is there a favorite place that you can’t wait to go back to?

CV: Well, the one that I always say and no one’s heard about it. Lord Howe Island. You know it?

PG: I know exactly where it is, sure.

CV: It is so beautiful. … It’s a semi-tropical island. They’ve got palm trees but they also have pine trees. Beautiful beaches, mountains. You can go scuba, you can go biking, hiking. It’s a small place. And you can stay at the Kapella Lodge which is the top spot on the island. Meals, wine, friendly Australian people, and the best natural views in the world.

PG: And how did you discover Lord Howe?


CV: It was on the list. A checklist is a great thing if your goal is not just to check the places off the list. A checklist gives you new ideas. If you say, “Well, I think I’ve been everywhere and don’t know where to go next.” Well, try the Most Traveled People list. It’s got 673 places. I’ve only been to 629. That’s 50 new places.

http://www.petergreenberg.com/2008/01/10/travel-tips-from-a-travel-hero-charles-veley-the-worlds-most-traveled-man/


This was written about 12 months ago.

now this is just wrong 

LOL, chill, they're not talking about Osun. . . .as of yet

@post
I kinda agreed. The Lagos air stinks

you read nonsense like this and you just go into silence mode for a few hours. Responding immediately is near impossible.

Then Peter Greenberg must be a stupid man then!!

These are lies the whiteman uses to surpress the black man.
Fashola has transformed lagos into another Dubai recently
tongue in{ seek} , eh.?

Are we supposed to be comparing ourselves to those countries? 

@poster: it is true that if you don't know it, you can not miss it. you need to travel more whenever you visit lagos again.
every city and every country has the ugly side, therefore it makes no sense to only focus on the ugly side of lagos. there are other beautiful sides, you just need to get out of the box and discover these areas. darling, you might not know exactly what you're missing.
lagos and abuja (nigeria) for life!

this statement alone shows the guy is fronting for some hidden people- possibly some of these anti-Nigeria Nigerians.

anyway, he's entitled to his opinion. Some parts of lagos smell. So does New Jersey. People still live there.

and his countrymen living in lagos must be digging through the mountains of trash with imported shovels, unlike the local residents who use locally made ones.

so lagos has international fame because of oil money? duuuhhhhh

this is why people should read every once in a while. Go investigate which part of west africa was known as the slave coast. and why.

kobojunkie - lagos is oil rich? is lagos ph?  

only private companies still have head offices in lagos. all governnt parastatls now have head offices in abuja

lagos was 'built with oil money' over 20 years ago.

finally, if you've been to abuja recently, you will know no one can honestly call lagos nigera richest city. the development going on there is something else.

unimaginable poverty? i beg to differ.

 
Lagos is Not Oil rich in the literal sense but it was built and still gets a huge portion of oil money coming in to it as a result of the many private companies that are headquatered or have huge offices in Lagos. Even Banks which run on oil money bring a lot of it into Lagos.


Like I said, Nigerian capital was moved to Abuja, that did not take away from Lagos. Lagos remains the centre of commerce in Nigeria.

You sure?


You can not measure richness by simply observing of amount of development going on in each. There is more to the difference between lagos and Abuja than what you see.



LoL. . . . well, to each his own.

and that pains you for some reason.

Lagos is shit, Lagos is that, Leave Lagos alone, we that live there are humans and i was born there, still alive and even healthier than most of those born in their own Heaven. 
If you don't have anything to write about
Then write about how to save the world from those who kill in the name of God and in the name of Saving the world from Terrorism.

Maybe there's a special pipeline underground from Delta and Portharcout leading into Lagos state government's house